A Little Conversation
by Breathesgirl
Summary: Written for Sephrenia's writing challenge, May 2014. Sookie talks to Gran's spirit to help her make a big decision; Eric listens from the shadows.


**A/N: Hey everyone. I know it's been a good long while since I posted something over here and I am sorry for that. Unfortunately my muse has taken an extended vacation and only 'visited' home long enough to get this done then popped off again. I hope she's having fun in the sun somewhere.**

**This is a one shot which was written for Sephrenia's writing challenge.**

**It is complete as is and I know where I would like the story to go but I do not have the knowledge to do as I wish to: that is I want the story to be about their travels but since I haven't traveled I'm hoping my readers could do so. If you live somewhere, any where**, **please write something. I'll edit it and post it here and wordpress with full props**

**Now, on with the show. Enjoy :).**

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"Gran, the humidity of summer has finally ended and the cooler weather of the fall has finally taken hold. I feel like I can breathe a little freer now and the cooler weather is only one of the reasons." That's my beloved speaking. One would think that speaking to a grave marker wouldn't help a human, full or part, feel better or help them make some of the bigger decisions in their lives. One would be wrong on both counts though.

I know she has come here many times over the years we've been together and it never fails to either help Sookie or amaze me that spending some time in a cemetery could be so…I guess therapeutic is as good a word as any.

It's not often I'm privy to her private conversations with her long deceased loved one but this night I'm watching over things, making sure My trouble magnet hasn't attracted any unwanted attention. It's been many long years since the worst time of her life and Sookie has only grown more beautiful, both within and without.

Her physical beauty has not diminished any although she claims that what she calls crow's feet and frown lines detract from her attractiveness. To me they add to her beauty. Those lines mean she has lived a full life; faced the tribulations head on and battled them down to where she can stomp them beneath her sandal. She has come out a better and stronger, and wiser, woman for having gone through whatever trial she has had to face.

Her inner light has only grown stronger with each passing year as she defeats the demons which plague her soul and her body.

The ravages of time have been kind to my beloved. Time has not aged her as she once feared it would. She does not have the saggy skin of the white haired, aged wise woman and her joints are not popping and cracking with every movement.

Shhhh, Sookie is speaking again. "Gran, I have a big decision to make and I would like it if you would help me figure out the best decision for me. Do you have the time Gran?" She sounds so wistful, almost like she is expecting her Gran to appear before her to offer the words of wisdom Sookie so longs to hear. I know not what she has on her mind although I have my suspicions.

"Gran, I feel inadequate. I feel like I'm not enough for Eric anymore. I feel like I've held him back all these years; that he stayed in Bon Temps simply because I couldn't bear to leave you. Yeah, we've gone on trips together and stayed a week here and a month there but I don't feel like he's living up to his potential any more.

Sometimes I feel like he's lost his way in life. He used to have such a zest for life; he would take the bull by the horns and bully it into doing what he wanted it to; not so much anymore. I feel like I've tamed the beast. I didn't want to tame him though, I wanted… Oh Gran…" Her voice cracks as she fights back the tears that are threatening to spill over.

"Oh, he says that he's quite happy staying here with me but what I feel from him sometimes is more like he's settled because he knows I don't want to live anywhere else but he can't bear to leave me so he can go and do what he wants to do or go where he wants to go.

I don't want him to go but if he feels it's what he needs to do I'll hold my head up high, stick my chest out proudly and just be happy that I was loved by such a wonderful man.

I'm not afraid of staying here alone Gran. My kin come and visit sometimes and then there's the human side of the family and my friends but none of that is worth much without Eric, Gran."

I watch as a warm breeze ruffles her honeyed hair which has started to turn to the silver of her fairy kin. Sookie leans into the breeze slightly and sighs quietly, almost like it's the touch of her loved one comforting her.

"I know Gran. The house will always be here but it's my home. I can't remember ever living anywhere else. It was always you who was there for me day in and day out, no matter what was going on in my life. You were always there with the words of wisdom and a comforting hug and sometimes an ice pack when the headaches were at their worst."

She sighs deeply, unshed tears glistening in her eyes.

"I feel like I would be abandoning you if I were to leave, yet I would be abandoning Eric if I were to stay here with you. My head knows that you will always be with me no matter where I lay my head Gran but it's my heart that's causing all this confusion. It is telling me so many different things that I don't know which end is up sometimes.

I've had to watch so many people I love die and it started so many years ago with Momma and Daddy, then Aunt Linda and Grandpa then you and all within what, to me, felt like such a short period of time. I lost all of that within the span of twenty years. If you count Hadley running off that's one person every five years

I've had to watch even more people leave me since then. How do you get over such loss?

Yeah, I know the question's been a long time in coming but I wasn't ready to go on with my life back then. I don't really know if I'm ready now but I have to be.

I need to tell Eric that I'm finally ready to let the past go and live in the present and look to the future.

I know it won't be easy but it can't be any harder than trying to live the easy life.

The easy life is just that, easy. There isn't any challenge to my life any more.

In some ways that terrible time was also the best because it tested me and made me a better person.

It's been nearly a century since there has been any kind of trouble.

Trouble always used to find me but it hasn't in a very long time so maybe I should go looking for trouble rather than having it find me. Maybe then I'll be prepared for it rather than surprised by the fact it found me yet again."

So that's why she's been so morose lately. She's been preparing herself to finally move forward. Living in the here and now might have been easier if I had turned her but she didn't want that. She loves her sun and her food and I love her enough to let her be selfish. In a way I'm being selfish as well since I love the smell of the sun on her skin and I am able to taste the foods she's eaten on her lips and in her blood so it's not like I haven't gotten anything out of this arrangement because I definitely have.

I lean back against the tree I'm sitting in and think back over the last several months. The anniversary of Adele's passing fell within that time frame, as did that of her cat. (I do not know why she has mourned an animal for two centuries but I've never claimed to totally understand Sookie Stackhouse perfectly either).

She has always had trouble around the time of Adele's death. As I understand it she never got a chance to tell her good-bye and that she loved her. She also felt guilty that her association with that ass, Compton, got Adele murdered. No amount of comforting or nay saying has gotten her past that and I doubt it ever will.

I thought that was what funerals were for though; to tell your loved one good-bye. Maybe I'm wrong? Maybe it's so those who are still among the breathing can feel better because they were able to give a proper send off?

She has not recovered her usual bubbly self this time though and, looking back, I can see that the depression started much further back than those two anniversaries. It started on our anniversary; January first, the night she found me wandering, lost and alone, and took me in.

"Gran, I love Eric with all that I am but I feel like I'm two people.

There's the Sookie who never wants to leave here and stay close to all that I know and love even though there's only really you here now.

Then there's the Sookie who wants to stop being selfish and let Eric be who he needs to be.

He did what he had promised me a long time ago: He's brought me to his side, all who owe him fealty bow to me as well and, once things settled down, he left his job and came here to live with me but I don't think that's enough anymore."

She sighs and the tears finally fall. I want to go to her and comfort her but both Sookie and Pam have told me, many times, that sometimes a girl just needs to wallow for a little bit. I don't have to try to fix every problem: Sometimes just listening is enough so I sit here on my perch and watch as my beloved cries.

Finally her tears dry up and she smiles sadly, "It's time Gran. It's definitely time I left this place. It's time I grow up and face the world and with Eric by my side I can do it! It won't be easy and I'll definitely keep the house so I can sometimes come back for a short visit but I have a life to live and someone who loves me to live it with. I'll always miss you, and everyone else, but as you've told me countless times you'll always be in my heart and my memories so you'll always be with me."

Sookie stands and turns toward where I'm hiding, "It's okay to come out now Eric."

I'm not surprised that she knows I'm here but I am that she's allowing me to share a little bit of this special time.

I lift into the air and land softly in front of the one being who accepts all of who and what I am and smile down at her. She returns my smile and takes my hands with hers, "Eric, what do you think about travelling? I've hid inside my bubble long enough, it's time I got out of my comfort zone and experienced what the world has to offer and I can't think of anyone I would rather do it with."

I smile at her, "I have just one question before I answer yours. Do you want me to let you chicken out or do you want me to be high handed?"

Sookie huffs and crosses her arms over her chest but smiles just the same, "High handed of course. I wouldn't have it any other way."


End file.
